


Tomorrow is a Long Time

by thebombardier



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: M/M, Post Reichenbach
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2012-02-06
Updated: 2012-02-15
Packaged: 2017-10-30 16:57:32
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 4
Words: 4,361
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/333984
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thebombardier/pseuds/thebombardier
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>After the Fall, Sherlock sees the world. He promises a brave new world to the people he loves and saved, does his best to deliver, and hopes that it's enough to fill in the cracks he left behind.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> This is unbeta-ed, unbritpicked and only mostly finished as of right now. I apologize in advanced for any Americanisms I may have left in.

He smells plastic upon waking up, and sees Molly Hooper smile sweetly.

"Ah, heaven it is then." Sherlock manages to croak out. He smirks, but his entire body is on fire. Definite concussion, broken arm, dislocated shoulder, probable broken ribs, very real bruising the rest of the way down. He tries to sit up, but the world is spinning. He reckons faintly that he fudged that landing very badly. 

"No, no, no, stay still," she shushes him, turns to the side and says something he can barely hear to someone he can barely see. He closes his eyes, wills himself to dead weight and he is rising. The bags and garbage fall away and there's just hands carrying his broken body, setting him on cool plastic. They move, the sun is replaced by fluorescent and the plastic is thus replaced by freezing metal.

"I'm sorry, I can't spare your clothes." She says softly, cutting away at any and all available fabric. He doesn't mind too much, thoughts groggy and clouded, he can barely begin to process the slow bubbling guilt in the pit of his stomach, won't be able to for a very long while yet.

Thank God for the morphine drip.

He slips in and out of consciousness for a little over a week. Sometimes, he wakes and Molly is checking his IV. She looks at him sadly before he blacks out. He’s not a dead body, and even though that’s her forte, she’s doing well enough. He finds Mike Stamford once or twice, supposes Molly was a bit out of her league, it should be fine. Sometimes, it's his brother, and he has to resist the urge to groan because the look of apologetic hurt makes his heart pound in the most unfortunately human way possible, but he's out again before he can dwell on it.

It worked perfectly; Mycroft tells him when he's able to stay awake for longer than a few seconds at a time. All three intended targets are alive, but Sherlock’s body is wrapped in plaster and gauze, and he can't move very well, itches terribly, but he supposes it's for the best. Everything is silent as Sherlock stares indifferently over Mycroft’s shoulder.

“I’d imagine you’re wondering how he’s doing,” Mycroft says quietly after a prolonged silence. Sherlock doesn’t answer, and Mycroft takes the silence as an invitation to continue.

“He hasn’t gone back to work. He’s in serious danger of losing his job. He barely eats,” he pauses for dramatic effect, and Sherlock’s gaze begins to burn holes through him. Mycroft mouth quirks up at the edge before he continues, “Why, I’d imagine he’d be writing sad music if he showed any musical talent.”

“I did what I had to do,” Sherlock spits defensively.

“I’m not saying anything contrary,” Mycroft shifts his weight.

“What would you have done, brother mine?” Sherlock sneers. Mycroft contemplates his brother while he thinks on it.

“I can honestly say that I don’t know,” he says finally, and with that he makes his leave.

+++

They’ve hidden him in the basements of Baskerville. He figures it out after pulling the IVs from his arms, and stumbling the direction to the nearest exit. His brother is waiting, still looks strange (remorse? How sentimental), but doesn’t stop him.

Instead he walks with him, pausing when Sherlock has to lean against the wall, doesn’t say anything, which Sherlock is thankful for. Mycroft leads him to a parking garage, to the car that has kidnapped John so many times, and opens the door for Sherlock. They get in the car, and they drive; no Anthea, no chauffeur, just brothers.

He’s healing, mostly out of danger, and Mycroft owes him greatly.

“I trust you’re keeping surveillance,” Sherlock comments, pointedly looking at the passing scenery.

“Of course,” Mycroft replies airily, hand calmly resting on the bottom of the steering wheel, “Much the same as last we spoke on these matters.”

Sherlock doesn’t say anything.

It takes a long while, and he’s absolutely exhausted when they finally reach their destination. Mycroft presents him with new clothes before he retires for the night and Sherlock immediately changes. He’s been wearing hospital gowns for far longer than he thinks entirely necessary. For the first time since he left for university, Sherlock sleeps in the Holmes manor. His thoughts as he drifts off are turbulent and laced with what he later neatly labels ‘regret’ as he stores them away in the far reaches of his mind.

It’s been a month since Sherlock Holmes saw John Watson. When next they meet, it’s a cemetery. It’s the cemetery they buried Sherlock’s father, the place Mummy will lay whenever powers that be decide she’s had enough and his own supposed resting place. It’s here that he finds John. Sherlock observes for himself the damage he’s wrought, heart aches when he notices the cane, wants desperately to run and embrace and kiss and do all the things he put off before the fall. 

Above all that he hates. He hates himself for letting it come to this, for allowing Moriarty to beat him so spectacularly. The figures at his tombstone are evidence of his fall from grace, they bear the burden so much more than Sherlock Holmes who is presumably dead and buried, but really stalks shadows as a ghost among them.

John speaks, but he’s too far away, and Sherlock must be to keep the illusion. He cannot know that the man he mourns is so very close. Sherlock stays long after they leave, after the rain that has been threatening all day begins to pour.

He pays with a rather nasty cold, but it’s really not enough.

+++

He never returns to Baskerville. Mycroft offers asylum where ever he can manage to get it, keeping Sherlock both occupied and out of danger should someone in London recognize the Reichenbach Fraud. The healing process is long. His mind races constantly, dreams of John, of Greg, even Mrs. Hudson and soon Molly Hooper: the people that he comes to understand he loves. The last of the bandages cannot come off soon enough, and when they do he is transformed.

Moriarty may be dead, but his network lives on in a sick sort of tribute.  

It must be eradicated. If Sherlock can offer anything to these people who have broken him down into something so human, it’s the safety of a brave new world without the constant threat of danger that he unintentionally dropped in their laps.  He will work until they are gone, or he will work until the cogs stop turning and the inner workings begin to erode. One cannot exist while the other lives, and as it stands, Sherlock Holmes has no intention of being outlived by the ghost of James Moriarty.

There are no leads, the trail died when the bullet exploded brain matter on the roof. It’s the challenge of a lifetime, and for once, he’s not enthusiastic about the chase. 


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Year One

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Still unbeta-ed, still unbritpicked, still sorry for any and all incoherency and Americanisms.

The first year without John, Sherlock soldiers on, becomes the spirit of the man he was before the doctor entered his life. Sherlock Holmes goes into a state of suspended animation, while his body becomes whatever name he can steal, dresses in borrowed clothing, plays the parts well. Patches are a luxury, whereas cigarettes are easy to come by. The only thing that would complete the occasion is cocaine, but Mycroft is not as eager to include that in his periodic gift boxes.

No matter the distraction of the case at hand, Sherlock sometimes slips up, and the life he left rushes back to him with enough force to leave him reeling in its wake.

He talks out loud and waits for a reply that will never come. It always throws off his thought process and he finds the whole ordeal unreasonably wearisome. After he tells Mycroft (wholly unintentional, as it were), he is provided with a new skull that is slightly larger than the one on the mantel on Baker Street, and does a good enough job as a replacement, but still feels wrong.

One day, Sherlock wonders, and finds himself putting his lips to the skull’s toothy grin. He can imagine stubble, skin, muscle, warmth, the unique smell of aftershave and antiseptic if he tries hard enough.

“Bloody awful,” he muses holding it far enough away to observe a reaction that should logically never come, “that was all teeth.” He grins.

For a split second, he can see John’s image (a full apparition), warm skin on his. When he can’t imagine the reaction the doctor would have, he realizes what he’s doing. Sherlock’s grin falters, and immediately sets to chain smoking a slightly stale pack of Lucky Strikes before he can move on.

Somewhere outside of Kiev, Sherlock thought he knew, but he really couldn’t even begin to fathom. Moriarty’s influence spread far beyond the realm of his imagination, which is admittedly quite vast. He spends months sorting through various crimes worldwide and trying to find the pattern. In the end, he is left with a spider web of a map that spreads from one corner of the world to the other with masses of tangles in between.  

The map becomes an idol of sorts with the time Sherlock invests in studying it. It’s a convoluted mess and he can’t find any other connection aside from the obvious dead man who orchestrated the whole thing. He hates this, hates that Moriarty mocks him by besting him yet again, hates that he’s been away from London for almost five months, with really no hope of returning for at least another. He hates himself for taking so long trying to work through the muck he was left.

He should be home by now, apologizing (will sorry ever be enough?) and making right the things he wronged when he let everything get to his head.

 He almost passes out as he’s making his way through Calgary International, but it’s remedied well enough by a disappointing sandwich from the airport’s food court. John would have made damn sure it didn’t happen, taken them out or made him food or something to keep his body running relatively smoothly.

“Christ,” he curses into the soggy bread, as if it could tell him exactly when he lost his self sufficiency.

His agitation gets the best of him when he runs out of cigarettes later that evening in Chicago and destroys the room later still. It is the first Christmas he spends away from London, and it is easily the worst one on memory.  

It isn’t until late February, somewhere on the outskirts of Dubai that the pieces begin to come together. He sits nearly naked in the tiny hotel room Mycroft graced him with. The wall unit broke down the day he arrived, and though it is only barely reaching 30C outside, the rising heat in the room is nearly driving him to insanity. He checks the news, ponders the map and suddenly, it clicks.

He’d broken into the apartment of a suspected arms dealer earlier that morning, and written on a coffee stained piece of yellow legal pad, under a pile of books were the words, _S. Moran_ and _L115A3._ It takes minimal effort to find that the letter/number combo is a fairly advanced sniper rifle, and only marginally more work to figure out that S. Moran intends on obtaining the gun, if he hadn’t already gotten it (probable: dust build-up suggests the memo was several weeks old).

After snooping around on the internet, he finds a lead with a promising young sniper who was given a court martial and subsequently discharged after a number of bodies turned up following a patrol by his men. He grins smugly.

“Sebastian Moran, discharged army, he’s the second in command,” He breathes, scans back to the limited conversations between Moriarty and himself for confirmation, “Stupid, stupid why didn’t I see it before? He was probably the one sent after you, John. Symbolic, amateurish. Get to him, and the whole thing falls apart completely. This means I’m that much closer.”

He pauses.

“Did you hear me John,” he turns to the empty room, “I’ve got it, I’m on the- Oh. Right.”

He turns back to the computer and opens John’s blog. Reading his words does nothing to ease the sense of longing that hit him like a ton of bricks.   


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> As with previous chapters, this is still unbeta'd and subsequently unbritpicked. Apologies for grammar and Americanisms.

The second year, he meets unexpected difficulties. He pushes caring to the back of his mind, but it always worms its way back to the edges of his subconscious, always there, lying in wait.

After finding that the entries on John’s blog are being systematically deleted, he concluded that John is in the process of moving on. Surveillance says there is no one in the flat on Baker Street anymore, save Mrs. Hudson, and it doesn’t appear that anyone will be moving in any time soon. Mycroft’s doing, of course. He doesn’t quite know what to feel about the empty flat, and wonders vaguely if Mrs. Hudson is keeping up the appearances, or if he and John shall return to a horror of dust and grime, when footsteps on the landing of this particular safe house just outside of Santiago rouses him from his musings.

“Get out,” he says simply, not wanting to talk to anyone, least of all Mycroft. He doesn’t look up from his laptop, and when it becomes evident that Sherlock won’t acknowledge him, Mycroft casually tosses an envelope on the table in front of his stationary brother. Sherlock waits until he leaves to pick up the envelope.

Sherlock studies the envelope, turns it over to take in everything. Subtle pink, very faint flowery aroma, woman’s handwriting on the return address. The contents of his stomach immediately turn to lead.

Sherlock doesn’t need to open it to know what it is. Doesn’t have to read about a wedding he was not invited to, because ghosts don’t exist. Doesn’t even want to consider how uncomfortable John will look surrounded by the friends of his wife at the big hoopla of a wedding that Sherlock has already figured should surely be the only real outcome of the current sequence of events.

Any emotion he tried to suppress bubbles up and threatens to boil over. He breathes in and exhales a trifle of the building emotion. He repeats John’s name disappointedly like a mantra until his stomach settles.

There is nothing to be done about it, but he struggles to focus on his current objective. Every faction he severs from the greater syndicate brings no relief, no joy, just the knowledge that he is that much closer to reaching the end of this journey. It also reminds him that September is looming closer, bringing with it ever increasing wedding bells.

The morning John is to be married (Saturday, September 21), Sherlock finds himself in Mexico, face to face with the new leader of the Moriarty Empire. Ex-army, crack shot, really the only difference between John Watson and Sebastian Moran is a matter of morals. John is a healer, whereas Sebastian is a killer.

He should have brought a gun, Moran certainly did.

“It’s hardly fair,” he calls through clenched teeth after ducking for cover (it’s too late, he’s already been shot; 9mm bullet, left arm, graze wound, can work around it), “shooting at an unarmed man.”

“How would you prefer we do this then, Holmes?” Moran calls back.

“No weapons,” Sherlock says faster than he can think, “Man to man.”

And they fight. Moran has kept up with his training, regardless of his (dishonorably) discharged status, and is subsequently stronger than Sherlock, gunshot wound notwithstanding. The one thing Sherlock can count on (and he relies on it far more than he should) is that Moran will fight like an animal. He swings, and he grabs, and he claws and Sherlock takes it all in stride.

 A near miss of a rather deadly looking left hook throws Moran off balance and Sherlock seizes the opportunity, pins the soldier to the ground beneath him and strategically places his hands, body weight, and concealed knife for maximum efficiency.

Any sign of noncompliance will result in death. He does not need Moran alive to dismantle Moriarty’s empire, just wants, needs to know.

He interrogates carefully, Moran is a relatively smart man, but not smart enough to see when he’s being bested. Sherlock reads between the lies Moran feeds him and learns more than the sniper could possibly have hoped to hide.

By the time he gets the necessary information out of the Moran, they should be walking down the aisle. Sherlock slashes Moran’s throat with an elegant flick of his wrist. It’s the least he can do. Moriarty’s influence will begin to crumble with the things he has learned tonight, but it didn’t happen soon enough. John has moved on, and there is really nothing left for Sherlock to relish in.

He stands over the body long after the final breath, and watches the sun rise through the haze that covers Guadalajara.


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Unbeta'd, not britpicked. Still sorry. Enjoy anyway.

It’s been almost three years, but he finally comes home. He is battered, gaunt and scarred, not quite the same man he was before, but God, if he doesn’t deserve the familiarity of the flat he shared with John so long ago.

It’s empty. Has been since John moved out, got married and almost immediately widowed. Sherlock was assured that she was lovely, and kept John happy in their short time together, but it doesn’t stop the jealous pangs that threaten to eat him away bit by bit. It's selfish, and it clashes violently with a sense of gratitude to her for keeping John from doing something unthinkable.

He studies the room. Mrs. Hudson, bless her heart, has kept the place spotless, and everything is just where he left it. He contemplates exactly how one should rise from the dead when footsteps in the hall break his concentration.

“Like a spot of tea, Doc-“ She makes it to the doorway, and thankfully is not holding anything, “Sherlock?!”

He can’t come up with anything meaningful, so he settles on, “Good evening, Mrs. Hudson.”

“Oh Sherlock!” she tears up and moves forward. Before he can react, she’s wrapped her arms around him and squeezes, “Oh, I’ve been so worried!!”

“Yes, it wou- Wait, worried?”

“Sherlock, really now,” she scolds him, releasing him so he can witness her stern gaze, “Your brother has been paying me for this flat since John left. What other reason would he have to keep it around?” Sherlock is less surprised than he thought he would be, his heart swells with love.

“We Holmes were never a sentimental bunch,” he comments wryly.

“Have you talked to John yet, dear?” When he doesn’t answer, she smiles sadly and pats his arm, “I understand. He took quite a blow when you left. Anyway, sit down! I’ll make you a cup of tea.”

Sherlock is not sentimental, never was and never will be, but he knows that John is. He tracked the doctor’s route, knows that it sometimes takes him out of the way, by the flat on Baker Street. It is this he counts on when he leaves all the lights on in the living room.

He spends three days sitting in John’s chair, waiting. It really should be boring, but instead he pours over the most likely outcome of their reuniting, which involves a flurry of fists that he won’t fight back (90%). He will take all the punches in the world and more if meant that John wouldn’t leave (8.5% immediate possibility, 70% that it will follow the beating. Both are statistics considerably more than he is comfortable with). The other possibilities are so slim, they are not even really worth considering, and so Sherlock focuses on the probable, does not dwell on the 1% chance the John will be so relieved he will kiss him.

The third night he spends in the flat, he has tea with Mrs. Hudson, and it is there that he hears footsteps in the hall. Mrs. Hudson looks up toward the door just in time to see John Watson’s frame grace the doorway. His immediate reaction is to freeze. Sherlock notes John’s body tense, his mouth settle in a hard line and the way his hand clenches on the cane.

“Mrs. Hudson, you may want to take your leave.” He says calmly, setting his tea cup on the platter she brought up. He rises from the chair.

As soon as she’s down the stairs, John crosses the room with great speed and before Sherlock can even say anything, he’s swinging. Thankfully, he dropped the cane by the door, but he knows he’s going to bruise anyway. He lets John punch him until the power of the hits begins to wane.

“John,” he says quietly, but it doesn’t stop the blow.

“John.” He repeats, a little more loudly. Finally, he grabs John’s arms. John doesn’t struggle, but instead leans forward and buries his face in Sherlock’s coat. There’s nothing Sherlock can say to apologize for the last three years of the doctor’s life, and he knows it. Sherlock lets go of John’s arms, and embraces shuddering shoulders. They stand there, awkward, until John stops shaking.

“So,” Sherlock says tentatively after John pulls away, “Dinner, then?” John stares at him.

“God, Sherlock,” and he begins to laugh. Sherlock hesitates, but begins to chuckle.

“I kno-“

“Shut up.”

“But-“

“No.”

“John…”

“If you try to say another word, I’m going to kill you,” John’s voice wavers, but it doesn’t take away any of the seriousness of the implication. Sherlock is not quite sure if he’s joking or not until the corners of his mouth quirk up into a half grin.

They stay in. Mrs. Hudson brings John a cup of tea, and they exchange pleasantries until late. After she leaves, John insists on going back to his flat alone. Sherlock doesn’t argue.

It’s nine days before they reestablish communication, before John bursts through the front door slightly drunk and very belligerent. In those nine days, Sherlock waltzes into the Yard, casually tosses a memory stick onto the desk of the Commissioner, and in front of the gaping mouths and wild stares of the police who previously didn’t believe in ghosts, demands the reinstatement of Detective Inspector Lestrade.

He is almost immediately arrested for fraud and thrown in jail overnight. When he is released the following morning (Mycroft’s doing, can’t bring himself to be too bothered), he is pleased to hear that Lestrade will start work again as soon as the paperwork goes through. He’s not so pleased to hear of the reinstatement of some other members of the police force, but it really can’t be helped.

Later that night Mycroft tries to debrief him on the small things he missed while he was dead, but he really could just be talking to a brick wall, for what it's worth. Sherlock already knows about John’s wife, and her untimely death, read it in the way he carried himself and the ring he’s neglected to remove when they were reunited. Mycroft talks to him for ten minutes before he finally gives up and leaves.

Sherlock spends the rest of the week easing himself back into the cracks he left when he jumped. He solves two cases (one started boring, became interesting, the other did the opposite). He finishes on Thursday night, and as he settles back into the flat, fire under the kettle, he hears the scratching of a key in the lock.

Careful walk, tentative reach, grab, turn, pull and John throws himself into the room. He stumbles a little, but that’s not the first clue that John has had a bit to drink tonight. Sherlock leads John to his chair.

“Tea?” Sherlock asks, doesn’t expect an answer, makes two cups either way. He hands John the mug and then sits in the chair opposite. John frowns deeply.

“You’re angry,” Sherlock prompts John.

“You’re an ass,” John retorts.

“You’re also drunk,” Sherlock adds helpfully, “Are you sure you don’t to put this conversation off until morning?”

“No, fuck you, we’re talking about this now,” John sits up and slams his mug on the coffee table. Sherlock says nothing, stares politely at John thus making him angrier.

“Well?”

Sherlock clears his throat.

“I did it for you,” He says simply, knows he’s egging John on, really doesn’t care.

“For me?!” John looks incredulous, “Ever the goddamn romantic, you are. You fell off a building. I’m assuming you already know about Mary. Cancer. I knew she didn’t have long, knew it when we met. I’d thought we’d have more time… I was starting to believe I was cursed to kill the people I love.”

“I jumped, John.”

“What does it matter?!” John all but explodes, and is leaps off the couch with the force of it. He crosses the room. Sherlock looks placidly upward as the doctor stands over him.

“Did you even hear what I said?” he asks quietly, “Do you understand what that was like? What it did to me?”

“I can only imagine,” Sherlock replies, “I saw the world without you.”

“And how was that?” John leans over, balances himself on the arms of the chair.

“Use your imagination.” Their eyes lock.

“I don’t have to,” John whispers. Sherlock puts his hand on John’s arm, and in one motion stands and begins pushing him in the direction of his old bedroom.

“We’ll talk about this in the morning,” he says, opening the door. Sherlock pushes John onto the bed, yanks off his shoes, and throws the duvet over the doctor. He makes to leave the room when John tells him to stop.

“Please don’t leave me,” Sherlock stops in the doorway and turns. John props himself up on his elbows.

“You cannot expect anything from me considering your state,” Sherlock murmurs, in all seriousness.

“I’m not expecting anything,” John licks his lips, “I just… Please don’t leave me alone tonight.”

Sherlock stands there for a long while, John shifts uncomfortably. Finally, Sherlock closes the door and begins shrugging his coat off his shoulders. 


End file.
